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The Loach Forum Archives (1)
Sticks and stones will break my bones.....
Posted By: BB <nettech@bellatlantic.net> In Response To: Re: Does it look anything like.... (Kate)
Date: Wednesday, 2 June 1999, at 12:00 p.m.
but common names are a pain in my butt:) ...but I'm as guilty as the next when it comes to using them. Problem with common names are they leave doubt. Some are helpful and even descriptive such as skunk loach, zebra loach, horsefaced loach. Others carry a helpful insight to behavior such as weather loach, or clown loach. Others are just plain overused like hilstream loach, or tiger loach. Scientific names are great because they allow us to communicate species oftentimes without doubt as to what we are speaking of, but like the common names applied to species constant revisions make it hard to keep abreast. The thing I like best is alot of scientific names can be pulled apart to discover the meaning behind the name. After trying to use Greek and Latin dictionaries on-line without much success I still ended up using my trusty dictionary time and again. Learn to sylabicate the scientific names and find words with the same sylables and you can start to disern the meaning. Unfortunately there are no constants with this method either ..some fish are named for the location they are collected from, some for the female or male who discovered them, some even have meaning in the native tounge where the fish are endemic. I still have a few USO's swimming around in my tanks. For these fish I just try to associate their bodyshape to something fimiliar and go from there. The lizard fish I bought are similar to species that come from fast moving, high oxygenated waters that are clean and cooler then the botia species. The diet I speculated would be similar to them as well I would imagine. So far so good. One thoery for the common name of lizard fish I have is the ability to camoflague itself. Have you noted the ability of this fish to match that of its surroundings? When mine are on bogwood they darken up considerably whereas when they are against the sandy substrate as in the picture they appear to be lighter. Maybe it is my imagination, and me seing what I want to:) For what it is worth I have searched for information to feed my love for loaches and have not found anything that can compare to LOL. The species index is the most complete pictoral refrence guide I know of. If you can submit pictures of your USO it could only help others. Just my thoughts. BB
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